Smoking Lessons
by PinkWhirlWind
Summary: Takes Place after Evil Angel... Spike struggles to find himself again
1. Default Chapter

Smoking Lessons 1/? By Nix  
  
Disclaimers: I don't own Cowboy Bebop. Hope everyone sees the movie as it plays in the USA.  
  
Warnings.. Possible spoilers for the end, references to a not nice Julia. confused and hurt Spike  
  
Notes: This story follows Evil Angel, which is also listed in my account on ff.net  
  
Smoking Lessons 1/?  
  
Waking on the couch felt.. Normal, so normal, just like it had always been and for a few minutes, he just lay there, letting himself feel at home. His mouth felt.. empty, but he resisted opening his eyes. He felt lucky, as if he'd avoided a really bad hangover somehow. A smirk slipped onto his face, hide his eyes with the arm nearest the back of the couch. The white satin felt cool against his skin, smelled like.. he searched his mind for the right word, like cinnamon, and felt completely and utterly. not him. He wrinkled his nose and sat up, way too fast, and pain like his belly was being opened with dozen manual can openers all at once. He snarled at the pain and swung his legs over the side of the couch and glared at the white satin pants. That was just wrong! Not that he could explain why, but it was wrong.  
  
Worse, his fingers wouldn't stop twitching on his left hand. It was kind of surreal to just tilt his head and watch them. Forefinger and middle finger kept opening and closing as if they could catch something between them. His whole hand wanted to spasm in complaint of wanting something that he just didn't know what. In frustration, he smacked his chest where there was nothing but white silk now, but in his own clothes would have been inside jacket pocket where he kept his cigarettes. Now, there was just the impression of a crane in silk. His nose twitched and he caught just the glimpse of red hair and spying green eyes slip behind the other couch.  
  
"Um." He said. That person, he felt.. like it was a girl. He ran a hand through his hair, scratching and shaking the green fluff back up to something that felt more . homey. Oddly enough, an orange, he felt oddly pleased with himself for knowing what to call it, and more than a little worried that he felt proud of that, but anyway, an orange rolled from behind the other couch towards him and he reached down and caught it. Those green eyes poked over the couch again, and the hair stood up on the back of his neck. Whatever else was true, he did not like being watched. "This for me?"  
  
From behind the couch there was a, "Uh uh.!"  
  
He sniffed it and felt some kind of possessive instinct over the orange then. Though, he wasn't sure he really liked them and he had the slightest shadow of memory that someone had made him angry over an orange and the couch. The anger didn't feel. bad though, not uncomfortable. It felt familiar. It felt 'him' somehow. He opened the orange with his teeth and started peeling, trying to look like he was focused on the orange, while he was really watching for the green eyed kid to stick her head back out.  
  
The ship he was on seemed to be in a night time cycle with just him and the green eyed kid awake. It seemed like a beautiful opportunity and the smile that slipped across his face seemed to drip a wicked satisfaction deep into his soul. He scratched the back of his head and then ruffled his hair again. It was just too not right with it all neat and orderly. He wondered, as he stood up and started to stretch, the whole peeled orange already in his mouth, if he was maybe a pickpocket, at least that's what came to mind, that this feeling satisfaction was like having gotten real nice loot from someone's pocket.  
  
He felt, free in a way, and lost in another. His mind was clearer than... than he could remember it being. Then he thought, measured, he could remember, really his memories started when he got to the top of the stairs of the room he was still in. That emotional woman and the tough guy, and he wasn't sure if they were family or not, but seeing them, that was the earliest memory he could find. The ship felt like home too, felt like he was on safe ground. He yawned and quite without thinking he slipped into a forward stance and moved through a very small blocking kata, the grace of which wasn't diminished too much by the orange in his cheeks. That felt so right, but when he opened his eyes and tried to repeat it, it was gone. He moved, but his arms found no favorite path, just an awkward flinging of long arms. Irritated, he shoved his hands into pockets that weren't there, and chopped his orange.. He made a face and quickly closed a couple of the frog closures, so his chest wasn't hanging out for all the world.  
  
He was here in this place now, and he was going to look around. Obviously he wasn't a child and he wasn't born yesterday. He swallowed the second half of his orange and decided he felt like sin itself, but not really guilty, more .. cocky? He decided he didn't know if he liked himself or not, but anyone that self assured deserved the benefit of the doubt, so, fingers laced behind his head, he went back up the stairs he'd nearly fallen down earlier and went to look around.  
  
Thinking about earlier, he remembered the look in the dark haired man's eyes, the way those fingers had almost caressed him and he made a face at the memory. Something damn tweeky was happening with that. When he didn't hear anyone following him, he turned and looked back into the living room. "Hey, kid, you gonna follow me around or what?"  
  
"Okay!" She jumped up from behind the couch a dog on her head, of all things, spun in a circle and raced towards him. "Edward will go with Spike- person! Does Spike person know where he is now?"  
  
Spike, he guess that was his name, but what kind of name was that? He thought his name ought to be . Stephen or Vin, Michael maybe.. something.. something that didn't sound like a syndicate hitman. He sure hoped this kid wasn't actually related to him either. She seemed nice enough, but not quite all there, and well, he sure hoped he hadn't had anything to do with that. "I'm here." He yawned, licked orange juice from his mouth. "Thanks for the orange."  
  
"Yippeee!" Edward jumped up, spun, toes pointing, and Spike thought he might get dizzy just watching. "Edward didn't fail all the way! Spike- person knows what an orange is. What is Ein?"  
  
Spike almost held his breath. He hated tests, especially ones that asked questions that were supposed to be answered in a foreign language. "Ein? Is that usually dark red, comes in bags and the expensive stuff in glass bottles?"  
  
She snickered, and the dog on her head barked, not very loudly, just a small scolding yip. It made Spike look down at his finger, which didn't have even a scar, but he thought, he could almost feel that dog's teeth closing around his finger. "Peking duck. I wanted Peking duck."  
  
"Ein is on top of Edward! That's Ein! Here! You hold Ein! Maybe you'll remember more! More more more more more more!!!! More is good!" She thrust the short brown dog off her head and into Spike's arms, which unbalanced them both, sending the dog clawing at his chest and Spike staggering back into the wall. Ein clawed at the pink scar on his belly and Spike yipped dropping to his knees and cursing in words even he didn't remember the meaning to. The Edward though was gone, run off down the hall and then down the hatch and Spike was .. grateful.  
  
The dog whimpered and licked at him again, and Spike sighed, petting and feeling the softness of floppy ears. "She confuses me. How about you?"  
  
"Bark," Ein said, backing up just a little, and Spike was half sure the snout was smiling, not snarling so, but just a little more expression than he would have expected from a dog. Dog!  
  
"You're a dog. Do you have any idea what happened to me?" Spike sat there, legs wide and opened the white shirt to look at his belly again. It wasn't bleeding, but where Ein had clawed was red and it hurt. He touched, poking it gently, face screwed up as if he could expect at any moment to have some unpleasant memory to deal with, but nothing came. It ought to, from the look of the scar, healing wound, he wasn't sure which, but it really looked like something had tried to chop him in half. Someone had been pretty pissed at him, and really, that felt pretty right, felt quite true, and he thought, the echo of that was that he'd wanted to kill someone else too. "Say, Ein, do I look like a killer to you? Uh? Dogs don't hang out with murderers, do they?"  
  
Ein barked again and walked closer, close enough for Spike to start petting him again. Ein remembered when Spike had veered away, brought his big red bird over to save Ein, brought him home, kept all the scary people away. Spike had done that, as far as Ein was concerned. Spike had saved him from the bad biting thing too. Spike took good care of Edward too and Edward was Ein's best friend, who didn't treat him as if he were less than all the rest of them. So, this time it was Ein that veered to save Spike, at least as much as he could. "Bark," he said, wishing he could figure out why Edward could understand him, but no one else could. Still, he trotted down the hall, and hoped that Spike would follow.  
  
Spike got onto his knees, then pulled himself up the wall and decided that this whole weak thing felt WRONG. Not quite as wrong as the white suit, but more than enough wrong. Ein paused at the stairs and waited. Spike got the idea and hurried up, holding his belly as if that could do more than ease his subconscious. He picked Ein up and not too much longer they were at a door that looked more rusted than not, narrow and black. It didn't look like anything at all really. Ein barked. Spike grimaced. Worse, he didn't know how to open it. The handle seemed to have been taken off with a blow torch, on purpose.  
  
He tucked his tongue between his cheek and teeth and considered. now what made sense? Intrigued, he ran his finger tips along the edge of the door, then down to the amputated handle, trying to think, or at least feel where it ought to open. He was sure that it did. It felt even more his than the couch, more his than anything else he'd seen, and frustrated that he couldn't get it open, he kicked it, hard, and that might have been a mistake in the white silk slippers he was wearing, but it opened, creaking like an unforgiving landing. Ein barked and jumped through the oval door and Spike followed.  
  
Inside, he wasn't sure if he'd gone to heaven or hell. It smelled stale and salty, and delicious, completely and utterly delicious. His hand started twitching again and he brought his fingers to his lips, though had no idea why he wanted to kiss his own fingers. It made the inside of his teeth itch, this smell. He wanted something and he wanted it bad.  
  
The room itself wasn't so great. A small mattress lay on some metal boxes. There was a small computer terminal near the head of the bed. The sheets were not quite as clean as the couch, but there was also a closet, which he opened reverently, as if the answers to lift might be in there. His heart beat, fast, fast enough to make breathing harder, as he reached out to flick on the little light.  
  
It wasn't much. Three blue suit jackets, all pretty much the same. A couple tee-shirts, two pair of dark blue pants, a pair of shorts. To the side, covered in nice plastic hung a clean suit of the kind a martial artist might wear, flawless black, with a black belt hanging around the hanger. There was a pair of sticks with a chain between them hanging from a hook at the back and he reached out to touch them, throat closed off and tears slipping down his cheeks. He knew, felt deep in his bones that they were his, that his hands had polished the wood from using them, but he couldn't remember. He couldn't remember any of this stuff, even though he knew it had to be his. Squatting down he found a pair of boots, big and ugly, complete dirt kickers, and he smiled, pulling them out of the bottom of the closet. They were worn out, pretty much, the soles thing near the ball of the foot, and he threw the silk slipper off, slipped his foot in, wiggled his toes and came home one more time. His shoes, they were his shoes.  
  
"Hey," a woman's voice said, and he turned from where he sat, back to the bed, one foot in the blue boot. "Cinderella."  
  
"What's that supposed to mean?" he glared at her, at all the smoke around her face. She wore the oddest clothes, little more than shrunken shorts and a yellow halter top, held together with straps that were more suggestive than practical. It was really, the thing in her hand that held his attention. long and white, glowing at the end. Staring at it, he licked his lips.  
  
"You want a cigarette? You only had two packs. I took them both.. sorry," She said, sounding like she meant it, "I thought you were dead, you know?"  
  
"You thought I was dead," no, really he didn't know. "Why?"  
  
Her mouth fell open, smoke curling over her lip, and then she snapped her mouth shut and glared at him, really glared, hateful. "You ought to know."  
  
He swallowed and moved back to the closet to hunt for socks. "Anyone ever tell you that you're a bitch?"  
  
She smirked, then laughed, drawing a long puff of the cigarette before holding it out to him. "You, all the time. Prick. You know, I'm gonna kill that bitch when I get my hands on her. Here, you finish it. It's the last one, unless we can get some off Jet." She held it out between her thumb and forefinger, a bit of lipstick on the end.  
  
"What bitch," he asked, careless of his words as he studied the thing she was offering him. He swallowed and reached out for it, taking it with his thumb and forefinger too, licking his lips, not having any idea what in hell to do with it next. He brought it close to his lips, enjoyed the heat, but there was more to this, he was quite sure.  
  
"Try with your other hand, idiot. You smoked with your left hand. Only person I ever knew who would shot and smoke at the same fucking time."  
  
He looked down at his hand. Those fingers were scissoring again. He let them take hold of the cigarette, and even if the lipstick tasted wrong, all wrong, his body remembered what to do next and he sucked in long and hard on the thing she called a cigarette. He leaned back against his bed and held the smoke a minute, feeling, light and wonderfully happy at the moment Slowly he let the smoke back out, tucking his lower lip in and blowing it over and down, just like he had some fucking idea what he was doing. He wanted to thank her, but he needed to that again, just to be sure he'd remember it. The whole cigarette was gone before he felt comfortable opening his eyes again.  
  
She was sitting there, on her knees, that so black hair hanging by her face, crystal tears running down her cheeks. He sure as hell didn't want to deal with that, but he grinned and ate the last bit of the cigarette, laid it on his tongue, let her see it and swallowed.  
  
"OH gross! Oh Spike! You'll make yourself sick! You're not supposed to do that! Jet! He ate the cigarette! Oh my god, spit it out! Come on!" she had him by the open edges of his shirt, just about shaking him and he started to laugh, letting his weight prevent her from shaking him as he leaned back against his bed, head laying on the dirty sheets. He wondered only half concerned that she might straddle him and try giving him mouth to mouth or some shit. "JET!" She screamed.  
  
After a minute the dark haired man appeared in the door way, a spatula of all things in his hand. "What is it woman?"  
  
"He ate a cigarette! He ate the butt of my last cigarette!" She looked nearly hysterical and Spike wasn't sure he was okay with that, but figured it was just left over from whatever she thought he'd died from.  
  
"Good," Jet said, smiling. "Sounds like he's back to normal to me. Spike, want some bacon and eggs?"  
  
Spike hated to admit that he didn't know what exactly that was, but it smelled damn lovely. "I'd love some, thanks."  
  
Some crazed impulse had him reach out and grab Faye's barely covered ass too. He hadn't even said thank you, though he really had thought it, and her eyes went wide and she slugged him, hard, right in the chest before stomping out of his room. He started laughing again, one hand petting the dog that had laid down beside him. Okay, so he definitely wasn't dead. Bringing the cigarette butt back up and out of his mouth, he decided, that maybe he was just really glad not to be dead. Yeah. 


	2. Poodle Brain

Smoking Lessons 2/? By Nix  
  
Disclaimers: I don't own Cowboy Bebop.. I just do this for fun. The one's I own are at www.onepinkrose.com  
  
Warnings: Spoilers.. but if I told you what it spoiled, well, it would be spoiled.  
Ed knew she was dreaming. It was the kind of dream one couldn't just wake up out of though. She knew the man in her dream. Faye Faye had told her what Vicious looked like once. He sat on the edge of a bed, a hotel bed, in her dream, silver hair damp from a shower that she could remember hearing. He wore no shirt and the muscles of his back flexed as a he looked over his shoulder. She remembered thinking he was beautiful, a sculpture like something in a great cathedral somewhere.  
  
In the dream she sat right behind him, a sheet shifting over her body, which felt stronger, bigger in the dream. "Where the hell have you been, Vic? You know your arm needs stitches?"  
  
Edward whimpered as she recognized her own voice in her dream as Spike's voice. She rolled over on the floor by her computer and the dream restarted, coming back in more detail the second time. This time it went a little farther, with Vicious' smile causing her to feel funny inside, to feel very distinctly funny under the sheet and she moaned, trying real hard to wake up as Vicious reached out and ran his fingers down her face, into her hair and leaned closer, closer and she woke up right before she got kissed. "AHHHHHHHHHH!" She screamed, scrubbing the back of her hand over her mouth. "EWWEEwwwWWWW!"  
  
Jet looked over from the couch, up from the computer where he was working on his writing project and Ed launched herself at him, snuggling down into his arms like a child in her parent's arms. "Jet! There was a bad dream! Edward had a nightmare!!!"  
  
He was totally unsure how to deal with a child snuggling in his arms. If it had been anyone except Ed he would have tossed them off like hot coffee, but Ed kind of was his kid, at least some of the time. So he rubbed her back with his metal hand, as gently as he could. "Dreams can't hurt you, Edward. You know that, yes?"  
  
"But it wasn't just a dream," she said, hiding her face against his chest, trying to curl up into the smallest space she could. It was the middle of the day then, at least the Bebop day and Spike came into the living area then. He'd been wandering around all day, as if he were looking for something and it was getting on Jet's nerves. Something wasn't right with Spike, something worse than just some drugs and the trauma of getting disemboweled. "Spike! Sit down man! You're throwing the energy of the whole place off."  
  
Much to Jet's disgust, Spike's eyes went wide, almost terrified and he sat down on the other couch as fast as he could, holding onto the edge, like the whole damn ship was going to tip over at any moment. Jet sighed and decided to get to the bottom of this. "Okay, Edward, what happened to Spike? You said you failed at something and now you're dreaming about Vicious. What's going on?"  
  
"I got the message from Julia-person," Edward said, looking over her shoulder at Spike, then slipping out of Jet's arms to take her own place on the couch.  
  
Faye came down the stairs then, sat down, mostly watching Spike. She'd spend most of the morning sitting in her room watching the video tape of her younger self, thinking about how loss of memories like Spike had was not something she'd wish on even her worst enemy. It made her feel guiltier than anything that she would still rather have him here and alive, than dead. The whole vulnerable Spike thing was getting on her nerves too and hadn't even been a day yet. She wondered if she'd been like that when she'd just woken up and remembered the time they were chasing those missiles in the gate, and she hadn't know what would happen if she got enclosed in the gate. He was, and it hurt to think it, he was like her big brother, teasing her, teaching her, coming to save her. That kiss she'd had with Jet, and now the way Spike was, it only made her more confused. "Yeah, Ed, what happened?"  
  
"After I got the message, me and Mpu broke into their network and went snooooping." Edward wrapped her arms around her knees, propped her head between them. "I had a bad dream, Faye-Faye. I dreamed one of Spike's memories."  
  
"My memories?" Spike asked. Shivers went across his shoulders, and the room went very very bright, like his eyes would get burned out, even when he closed his eyes. When he opened them, Jet had him by the front of his blue jacket. Spike jerked to get away, but found himself pressed up against Jet's body, held tight one both of his arms behind him. "Let me go! Let go!"  
  
"Wait, Spike," Jet said, trying to be as gentle as he could without letting the struggling man go. "Ed thinks that what they did to you is still working, that you're losing more memories, really getting your head fucked up. We're trying to find the network connection so we can stop it."  
  
Faye, who seemed to be right behind him, started lifting his hair, looking at his scalp and his face scalded. "So what you're saying, Edward, is that this bitch linked into his brain like it was on a network, just like another computer and she's just erasing? She's still linked in? Wouldn't that kill him?"  
  
The glow of Edward's computer put her somewhere near his feet and Spike kicked in that direction, only to have the glow move a little farther away. "Let me go or I'm gonna fucking shot you! I will do it!"  
  
"What the hell are we looking for, Edward," Faye demanded, a bit of fear in her voice that satisfied Spike very much.  
  
"Not like a computer," Edward said, distracted, "Like Alzheimer-Vernon disease. Connected to his brain and triggered the synapses to tangle, to make also little space mines around the antennae and then to fire to fast, to flood neurotransmitter, modified like in Vernon's disease. So fast, it wipes out the memories, but Mpu and I made our own virus and we copied the patterns of memory." Edward looked up, goggles on her face, a huge frown on her face. Both Jet and Faye looked at her as if she were speaking ancient Greek.  
  
"So he's got amnesia," Jet said, still holding Spike on his feet, absolutely hating that the taller man wasn't able to stand on his own. So okay, given his injuries, he should have been on his back for a month, but Jet wanted it now, wanted his partner whole now. Holding Spike so close was absolutely worse now for the things he'd been thinking earlier. Hearts are stupid things to keep around sometimes.  
  
"What the hell does that mean? Does that mean he's going to get worse?" Faye demanded, not keeping herself aware enough and caught a back kick in the shoulder that sent her over the back of the couch and crashing to the floor. He might not be able to hold his own weight, but he could still put enough energy behind a kick, a lucky kick, "Asshole! Prick!"  
  
Jet shifted his grasp on Spike, taking hold of both arms and thrust him back so he could look in his eyes. "We are trying to help you! We are your friends!"  
  
The blush was gone from Spike's face though, leaving him paler than Jet liked, lines of stress around his eyes and forehead. Now that his arms weren't pinned, both of them went around his middle. "You're hurting me!"  
  
"Sorry!" Jet said, setting Spike down on the couch that Faye was just climbing over the back of. "Ed, can we get his memories back?"  
  
"Not amnesia," Ed said, looking stressed to try to explain to them this important thing, "All kinds of information got exploded, but I don't think it's as bad as they were trying to make it. Ed tried to trick the computer, to think that it was doing what it was supposed to," Ed sort of wilted a little, thinking about how she hadn't managed to save Spike. "We made a copy of Spike's mind and tried to get the computer to work on that one, but we saved a back up too. We were trying hard."  
  
Spike wasn't really listening to the kid. He was checking out the line of pain across his belly. He really wanted to kill someone for that! His finger came out from under his shirt bloody and he thought that might be pretty important for his 'friends' to know, but they were both focused on the kid.  
  
Jet frowned. It as all above his head, really, so he focused on what he could understand. "Where did you store the copy?"  
  
Ein barked and then lay his head back down on Spike's leg. Faye rolled her eyes, remembering how much Spike didn't really like dogs, or kids and went to shoo the dog away, but Spike reached out and stopped her, blocking her arm and then Ein jumped into his lap.  
  
"In Ein," Ed whispered. It had been a very last minute decision, and well, Ein was special. The lab he'd been stolen from had created him to carry a lot of data, but maybe not that kind of data.  
  
"In the dog? Spike's life's stuck in the dog?" Faye, for some reason that Spike didn't really understand found this incredibly funny, down right hysterical. Even Jet seemed amused.  
  
Spike on the other hand understood enough to know that his mind, his memories, his life were now tucked somewhere under some brown fur. Holding Ein in his arms, he shot up and glared at them all, the death glare lasted for nearly fifteen seconds before he flopped back down on the couch. "And how is this funny?"  
  
"Take it easy, Spike," Jet said, as he'd noticed the blood on Spike's fingers now. "It's funny, because, well, you'll find it funny too, when we get your memories back where they belong. We can do that?"  
  
"Poodle brain!" Faye teased, from where she lay on the floor behind the couch.  
  
"I'm gonna kick your ass," Spike threatened, even knowing himself that he didn't really mean it. He felt smaller though, ashamed to be him a bit. What the hell had he gotten himself into for someone to want to do this to him?  
  
"Let me look at your stomach, Spike, uh?" Jet said, sitting down on the table and reaching for Spike's shirt. "I ain't gonna hurt you."  
  
That only made it worse, made him feel smaller, less familiar with everything around him. "Yeah, sure, whatever."  
  
"So, Ed, is this thing she did, is it still happening? Is he still losing memory? How do we stop it?" Jet's fingers were gentle as they pushed Spike's shirt up, held it there. Spike closed his eyes, tightened his belly, making the lines of muscles stand out clearly. The whole scar across his belly was more like a wound now, open and weeping. Maybe one technology was conflicting with the other, Jet didn't know, really, but he wanted to kill someone too. "Ed what did they use to heal his gut?"  
  
"What happened to me," Spike asked, not sure he really wanted to know, but ready to just punch someone if they had the nerve to say it didn't matter.  
  
"You fought Vicious." Jet said.  
  
"EWWWWWW! You kissed Vicious!" Edward shuddered and Faye's eyes went wide like a deer in the head lights.  
  
"You kissed Vicious!?" Then she smacked Spike on the back of the head and he grabbed for her, opening his belly more and prompting Jet to grab him and hold him on the couch.  
  
"Faye, get me the med kit."  
  
She frowned, but went to get it, after tugging her arm out of Spike's grip.  
  
When she was a few steps away, Spike leaned close and whispered, "Who the hell is Vicious?"  
  
"A guy you knew when you were younger," Jet said, honestly. He wanted to know why Ed was also getting Spike's memories, but he didn't want to ask in front of Spike. "Ed, what do we do?"  
  
"Do, do, what are we going to do?"  
  
"Am I gay?" Spike asked, not really able to feel what was true and what wasn't anymore, "Jet, am I supposed to be dead?"  
  
"Hell no!" Jet took the med kit from Faye and set about taking out some supplies. It was completely disconcerting that Spike remembered one thing and not another, random and hit or miss, like someone had just played fifty- two card pick up with his head. "Don't you ever wonder about if you should be dead or alive. I sold my ass to the Red Dragons to keep you alive."  
  
"Me too," Faye said, reaching out to take his hand, real gentle, kind of asking before she wrapped her fingers around his hand. "I'm sorry about the poodle brain comment. I know you don't like remember, but I was real upset when I thought you were dead. Please trust us to try to help, try to trust us."  
  
Spike's nose twitched and he started to pull his hand back, but she didn't try to stop him, so he let her hold it. At the rate they were going, it might not happen real often.  
  
"Eyes," Edward said, blinking. She bounced onto the couch and took hold of Ein's face, peering into the dog's eyes. Both had gone pale blue, the color all faded away. Then into Spike's eyes, nose to nose, eyes going wider as he leaned back a bit, eyebrows arching up.  
  
"Edward! Get out of the way! I'm trying to put a bandage on him!"  
  
"Eyes," She squawked and went back to her computer. "Yes!"  
  
Faye caught Spike's cheeks, one hand on either one and turned his face so she could see his eyes. One was a brown, a light brown, like she remembered his lighter colored eye, the other was nearly golden. How could she not notice that before! "Your eyes are different colors."  
  
"And my hair is green," he said, rather disgusted. "Do you know why my hair is green?"  
  
"Maybe you color it?" Faye said, still happily studying his eyes.  
  
He scratched the back of his head, and leaned forward for Jet, to let him wrap the gauze around him. "So, Ed," Spike asked, sounding for all the world just like the Spike they knew, "What's the deal with the eyes?"  
  
"Edward is an idiot," She said, moving quickly through the data visible only to herself, "Spike person is going to pass out now!"  
  
"I am not!" he protested, then fell forward, limp against Jet, dark green hair fanned out over Jet's face, one long arm hanging down to the floor.  
  
"Well, he's a better patient this way," Faye said, standing up now.  
  
"Ed, this better be good," Jet grumbled, lifting Spike gently and continuing to take care of his wound. "What's the deal with the eyes."  
  
"Want Edward to explain completely, right now?" Edward's fingers moved faster, a glow around the edge of her goggles.  
  
"A little would be nice, Ed," Jet said, tucking the end of the gauze in, his hand holding the back of Spike's head as he very tenderly laid him back on the couch and swung those long legs up even though they hung over the end on this couch.  
  
"Edward is working on breaking the network link to Spike person. It's his eye, the cybernetic eye."  
  
"Ewwww," Faye said, leaning over so she could look, even though both eyes were closed. "He lost an eye? Which one?"  
  
"No rubber necking," Jet snarled, irritated that he didn't know Spike had lost an eye in the past either. He tugged Spike's shirt down, covering the flesh that he didn't have the right to look at either. Spike. He'd thought that he was wrong about being interested in Spike, but now, he knew he was more than interested. He knew he was in pretty terrible trouble over it. 


	3. Flower Games

Smoking Lessons 3/? Flower Games By Nix  
  
Disclaimers... I don't own Cowboy Bebop  
  
Warnings... Uh.. Haven't written this chapter yet.. So hard to say.. Probably swearing, yaoi leaning, yuri reference, het droolings on Faye's part, Spike's still sick, Jet's thinking a lot. now that it's written.. definite JetxSpike leanings. *nods nods*  
  
Flower Games  
  
Jet didn't like it. Faye made a lousy nurse and Jet didn't like that either. He should have known picking Spike up and expecting him to be in one piece would be too much to ask of the universe. Spike was never in one piece after playing with Vicious. Jet just hoped like hell that the crazy bird toting blond was really dead this time, cuz he didn't think he could deal with another round of broke Spike. Hell, he wasn't completely sure he could deal with this round of it.  
  
He ran it through his head, thinking, 'Gee, Spike, while we thought you were dead, Faye and I got drunk off our asses and decided we were both in love with you. Hangover's gone, but I don't feel any saner.' Yeah, that'd go over really good. Right up there with, "Gee, Spike, Faye wants to play with your gun, can she clean it for you?" Worse, Faye wanted to clean his gun, yes she did, and she was being really nice to him, even if she was a shitty nurse.  
  
She had gone to bed, finally. Jet had sworn he wasn't cooking a damn thing. Edward didn't seem interested in eating. She'd been working on whatever it was she was doing for nearly six hours now and she hadn't eaten when he'd made pizza at lunch. Ein had eaten hers and Jet's. Faye had gotten the rest. Spike hadn't moved and Jet pretended like he was ignoring them all, but he was really watching Spike's chest rise and fall, sorting out his thoughts about what this rebellious desire to touch Spike's lips really was rooted in, what the hell it meant that he wanted to brush green hair away from the sometimes sweaty face.  
  
Over the hours, he'd gone through moments of being just convinced that the skinny chest was going to go still. Spike had been his companion for well over three years, closer to four. It was companionship, he told himself, that was all he wanted. It was just that Spike had gone off looking for love, and Jet told himself that he was willing to give Spike anything to get him back, but just for his companionship. The human body didn't think nearly as neat and orderly as the human mind bent on logic though, and watching his friend breathe for six hours had given Jet plenty of time to think about things. It would be just like Spike, the damn vengeful bastard to nearly die, come back, only to convince Jet that it might possible to fall in love, to start feeling alive again, and then die. The little prick. The whole cosmic joke would be much funnier if it were only played on Faye. It would be much funnier if Jet didn't find himself looking at Spike in a whole different light.  
  
Spike's body was slender, that blue jacket laying over his chest, over hips that had no curve to them. He wasn't at all female, not at all what Jet had been told all his life to desire. The pale sharp angles of Spike's face weren't beautiful like the lady who'd left him, not even like Faye was beautiful, but there was something in the strength of those soft lips, something in the way dark green eye lashes that fluttered occasionally that just wrecked Jet's idea of himself. He wanted to sit closer, to touch the sometimes irregular pulse with his fingers, his flesh fingers, and feel Spike's life was still there and he wanted to confess it all to him, to have the sarcastic and rough Spike tell him . what he wanted to hear, Jet really wasn't sure. Spike had asked if he were gay. Jet didn't know, but he was going to guess bi-sexual and Faye's damn questions too, top or bottom, and a there was this electric current of jealousy when he thought of Vicious kissing those thing pale lips of Spike's. Had Spike opened his mouth, accepted the kiss? Would it be a ferocious kiss, like two ships dog fighting? It would be the kiss of someone who would stand their ground, be equal, look a person in the eye.  
  
Jet was a big man, muscular, hard as composite steel on both sides. He'd hurt Spike just holding him and Jet knew, sometimes he didn't judge his own strength well. He was a black bear to Spike's lean coyote. He'd never paid enough attention to his own looks. He thought, it was a way of punishing himself, for losses of the heart and of the body. Spike went for slender beautiful types, dangerous types, like Julia or Vicious. Jet wasn't gonna change, at least not much for Spike or anyone else. It was more than kisses he wanted, even though the thought of being.. touched that way by another human that he trusted, and even loved had taken a deep root now. More than that, more than physical, he wanted, and this was the hard part, he wanted someone to talk to, to be understood by. He couldn't say that he believed Spike could do that, especially not with his life and mind hanging on someone's rigged craps game, but if they could get him back, get him whole and strong again, then, then Jet wanted to give him the option.  
  
"Jet person," Ed said, laying on her back, fingers moving through the air still, slowly though. "Ed is thirsty and Spike person needs water too. Almost done, have found a doctor."  
  
That perked Jet up a lot, gave him something to do other than mull over his own thoughts and watch Spike breath. He sat up and rolled his shoulders, stretching some of the nervous tension out. "A doctor? For Spike?"  
  
Ed nodded, her mouth hanging open as Jet's computer shifted screens to display a woman, Asian and familiar. "Hey! That's the doctor who worked on Spike in Little Beijing."  
  
"No," Ed said, sighing softly, arms falling back to the floor above her head. "Ming Chrysanthemum, twin. She's waiting for us."  
  
"Ed!" Jet was going to complain about her making decisions for him. He was the captain of this damn ship not her, but she'd already fallen into an exhausted sleep and really, he'd go back to Julia if he had to, to save Spike's life, but this doctor's address was farther out, out on Eropa. "What do you mean 'twin'? How much can we trust this woman?"  
  
Ed pushed her goggles up and stared at Jet with tired, blood shot eyes, stared at him as if he'd gone completely stupid. "Twins! Like they're the same. One is Ming Chrysanthemum, the other Ming Hyacinth, like they were in their mother's tummy at the same time. Don't they have those on Ganymede?"  
  
Jet groaned. "So can we trust her?"  
  
"Trust her? Trust being far away. Bad people. But Jet-person, Spike person is dying." She let her eyes go closed, fingers twitching even as she tried to relax them. "Tired! Thirsty!"  
  
And this was his function in life. Pilot the ship, dole out food, just fucking peachy.  
  
On Eropa.  
  
Ming Chrysanthemum sat at her computer wearing blue scrubs that had been in fashion with medical laboratory workers for hundreds of years. There really wasn't that much one could do to improve them, really. She had short blue hair with dark brown roots and headphones that clung to her ears like little balls of fairy dust, sparkling and jumping with the beat of her music. She wasn't much in favor with the people her twin worked for. She wasn't much in favor of them gaining more power than they had either, especially when it looked very like her sister was stealing her research.  
  
The kid that had contacted her had sent some really interesting data, even if it had taken forever to receive it. It was really hard to believe and she was too angry to deal with more than just the data. It was a human experiment, raw and simple, live or die, just to see, she supposed. This guy, Spike Spiegel, he didn't seem so unique that he'd warrant this. Just a bounty hunter, at least at first look through the data, that's all he seemed to be. Okay, he had an interesting DNA pattern. A rare Venus mutation that caused green hair, meant his bloodline had probably been off Earth for quite a while. It was going to take a while to decode all the data she had, but it looked like a very advanced copy of organic data, the data from a human mind. She had speculated greatly about AI, about storing human memories, or retrieving them from damaged tissue.  
  
Damaged tissue was exactly what this had been retrieved from, using a technique evolved from one she'd theorized and she could not believe that someone had done this or that the someone who did this traumatic and damaging thing was her very own twin. She closed her eyes in her goggles, slipped a little finger under the edge of one and rubbed her eye. The good news was, she could fix it, if she got to this guy soon enough. Maybe that would be enough of a slap in the face of her sister's employers. Whatever they'd wanted to whitewash out of this guy, well, she'd put it right back. Then she'd run away, as far away as possible, make herself a new name too. At least her research grant at the University of Eropa was about expired.  
  
She blinked and refocused her eyes as a small instant message window opened up in her data stream. It wasn't any of the recognizable brands and certainly not something she'd authorized. "Hello flower of intelligence," the message said, from some idiot calling themselves Mpu.  
  
"I don't cyber," she replied, looking for a ban button of some kind.  
  
"Cyber? I want to help with Ed's project. I like your research. I have an idea how to help Ed's friend."  
  
"Who the hell are you?" And then followed one of the most interesting conversations of Chrysanthemum's life and just a little experimentation on Hyacinth's Patient Alpha.  
  
In Little Beijing.  
  
Hyacinth saw that there was a huge influx of data into her sister's network. Then she realized that someone saw her watching and much to her great surprise, her back door into Chrysanthemum's system was abruptly terminated, but not before she realized what her sister was probably going to try to do. At least she knew where the Bebop was headed and that Patient Alpha had not yet died. She also knew that she had to tell her Mistress, even if she did not want to lose her twin's life.  
  
Back on the Bebop ~  
  
Jet had set the ship on course to Eropa. They'd hit the gate and be there within a day. Ed had disappeared somewhere, and Faye wasn't any where to be found. Even Ein had gone off with Ed, but the damn dog had looked back, giving Jet the oddest look. It made him wonder just what kind of thoughts Ein had about Spike's memories. Which lead him to the uncomfortable worry that maybe in that little canine brain, Spike's personality was looking out, watching Jet watch Spike breath, and understanding, understanding in a very adult human way just how Jet was looking at Spike.  
  
"It's my ship," he said to the room, with an audience of just one half comatose Spike. He stood, pulled the table a little nearer the couch he had been sitting on and moved around to Spike's side. It was fate, all the demons of the universe working to get him into trouble, but just then Spike started to shiver, a fine sweat breaking out over his face, both hands coming up as if he could ward something off, some attacker in his dream or some inopportune memory.  
  
Jet lifted him, half pulled him into his lap, holding him close to his chest. Awkward, it felt very awkward as the shivers grew stronger. Spike's chin tucked towards his chest, hair clinging to his cheeks, the back of his neck. Jet held, both arms around him, holding him as gently as he could, aware of the rip across his belly. After a few minutes, the shivering subsided, his breathing deepened, became even again. Jet found himself combing fingers through that fine green hair, telling himself that he was just loosening it up so it would dry faster.  
  
Spike leaned into the touch, rubbing his head against the fingers in his hair, and slowly tilted his head back. He was pale, feverish, dark smudges under his eyes, but, Jet's heart about exploded, when he looked into those eyes. Spike was in there, he was himself in that moment, aware, not lost. Their eyes locked. Jet's hand came to rest against Spike's cheek, tenderly, apologetic for the touch he hadn't had permission for, and those shivering lips mouthed, "Don't let me go. Hold onto me, Jet." 


	4. Green all the way Down

Smoking Lessons 4/? (six likely) By Nix  
  
Disclaimers. wah.. if I owned them Jet would be a demon and Spike an elf.. Faye a vampire.. *wicked laugh*  
  
Warnings: Spike's thoughtful, stream of consciousness.. nudity, stolen bubble bath  
  
Green All the Way Down  
  
Julia held the stack of disks I her hand, thinking about them. A human life certainly took up a lot of space, she could still hold Spike in her hand. Almost everything that Spike was, was right there. "You're sure then that he hasn't died?"  
  
It was a morbid question to ask. She didn't know that she wanted to know. Spike, the name brought back soft and gentle thoughts, but it wasn't practical.  
  
"I am sure that as of thirty-five minutes ago, he lived. They are headed towards my sister's university." Chrysanthemum tried to keep all emotion from her face. "I believe she has agreed to assist them in restoring Patient Alpha's mental structures. I also believe that the nanites may be failing in the abdominal wound."  
  
The risk was entirely too much. Debate flickered between their eyes silently. With a dismissive motion of her hand, she said, "Your loyalty is noted."  
  
Chrysanthemum bowed politely, took three steps backwards, then turned and left. She still had her finger on ice. She had a plan. First, she had to email her twin. There was time for all things to end. The email she sent to her sister was very simple, "Run." And then she ripped her hard drives to removable media and followed her own advice.  
  
On the Bebop ~  
  
Jet had fallen asleep. Spike woke slowly, finding the room dark, the hum of the ship feeling like an island of life amidst the ocean of black that he imagined around them. They were in space, in flight. That made sense to him. He understood flight, in some way that made his blood feel faster, thinner. He rolled over onto his back, head still in Jet's lap. In the dark, eyes open, seeing nothing, not even shadows, he knew what Jet looked like, could see the outline in his mind. The confusion that rose up within him when he thought about Jet felt, he paused in his thoughts to try to identify the feeling and decided new was the best way to describe it. New. But New made it his feeling, his choice.  
  
Even though it didn't really matter, he closed his eyes again, took a slow breath. It was frightening how much pain he could block out, he thought. If he thought about it, accessed his body, he hurt everywhere, hurt bad. It was easy to just shut off the pain though, and then it became some dull ache that told him he ought to . to what? Go home to Jet. Home. That was a thought he liked. Home was like, he sought for the right words to put this feeling into more solid concepts, home was like a place to start. So. Okay. He didn't have a fucking clue about a lot of things, but he was home, and that was more than a lot of people could say. Everyone here obviously cared for him. The woman and this man, Jet, her name. He sorted around in the few take out boxes of memories he had, Faye, Jet and Faye both seemed to have the hots for him, and really, he thought he might be okay with that. It brought a smirk to his lips to realize that he couldn't both get excited and block out the pain, it was one or the other and for right now, he thought he was doing good to lay here in the dark and think.  
  
He didn't know where they were going, but the vibration of the ship, came up from the engines, through the floor, through the couch, and into his body like the subtle kind of endless roar. It said they were in motion to him. He liked that too, liked going away from where they were. Going forward, he thought, taking a deeper breath. Events had fallen over him in the last, what? Day? Had it been a day? Like a building coming down on his head, one floor dropping onto another, he hadn't been able to get a handle on what would come down next. He knew for a fact he didn't like living like that.  
  
Trying not to wake up Jet, he lifted his shirt and explored his belly, slipping fingers under the gauze. The skin was open from his left side, just below the ribs, all the way across, until it went just a little deeper on his right side. He couldn't imagine anything that would make that kind of wound and to make it worse, he was pretty sure it had been about four cm deep all the way across. What the hell had done that? Done it with this little arch to it, like. like something swung right across the front of him? He lifted an arm and ran a hand through his hair, fingers going back all the way until they touched Jet's leg, then just paused. Whatever it was he'd done, it had hurt Jet a lot. Jet, Faye, and the kid.. uh, Edward, they'd all been acting like the world was ending, like someone had ripped their guts out. It had been something that he'd done that had done that to them, because they cared about him.  
  
Too much thinking, he decided and sat up. The protest of his stomach made him close one eye and focus on his breathing for a few breaths. Jet spoke in his dream, nothing intelligible, just a mumble. Spike reached out, trusting himself to find the right distance, and traced his fingers down one bushy side burn, finding it much softer than he'd thought it would be.  
  
"Spike?" Jet asked, waking enough to reach out for him.  
  
It made Spike smile. He reached out to the large hand searching for his head, scratched the back of it, and said, "I'm here. Just got to get up and go to the can, uh?"  
  
"Need some help?"  
  
"Hell no," Spike said, feeling a smirk slip over his face. And even if he did need help, he sure as hell wasn't going to ask from a guy he kinda liked, kinda felt his blood go fast for. "I'm fine."  
  
"You sure?"  
  
Spike realized that Jet was still sleeping, mostly. He stood up, yawned. "Yeah, I'm fine."  
  
"That's good." Jet said, now finding more room on the couch and stretching out himself.  
  
And so he stood there, in the dark, feeling something warm drip down under his waist band. He laced his fingers behind his head, lips formed together like he was going to.. what? Whistle, that's what it was. The past.. the past was gone. He turned, found he knew the exact number of steps to the stairs, and knew the direction to the can. There were two, he realized, as he paused at the top of the stairs in the dark. One that was just a can, with a door. The other had a bathtub. Remembering that, the tub, that was like smelling bacon and eggs, which he now knew he liked very well. A tub was almost as good as sucking on a cigarette, yeah. Which he wanted another one of, very much, but not enough to wake someone up and ask.  
  
No, he wanted the tub, and to take a good look at himself. Down the ladder, through a corridor that he hoped didn't have anything that wasn't supposed to be there, and then, into the bathroom. It smelled like roses and soap, and laundry that wasn't quite dry. The light switch was. and he let his hand reach out, trusting his muscles to know, even if he didn't. He smiled as a warm yellow light filled the room, and shut the door with his foot.  
  
A minute later he opened it again, and threw out three pair of underwear, a lacy bra, and a pair of yellow shorts. He smirked at himself in the mirror, felt guilty for throwing the clothes out, but not guilty enough to pick them up. She said he was an asshole, and he really didn't want to disappoint her. He hung his jacket up on the line where her panties had been, then his shirt too, after he washed as much of the blood as he could out of it.  
  
It was a bit more serious, as he unwound the gauze, wanting to see this wound. It was going to scar, he though, dropping the bloody wrapping into a small pink plastic trash can. He still could not imagine what could do this kind of wound. He turned and examined his back in the mirror, looking for other scars, wounds. He supposed the little round puckery spots on his body had been bullet wounds. A talent for pissing people off, he wondered. There was a short narrow scar on his shoulder, both front and back. Something had gone clean through, he guessed. Something that he couldn't imagine.  
  
Leaning close to the mirror, he searched his face, both eyes, which were different colors and seemed quite odd, quite the wrong color to him. The woman had suggested he colored his hair, but he couldn't find any roots. It was dark dark jade all the way down and so were his eyebrows. He didn't have much hair on his chest, just two little pink circles. One of those was messed up a bit by the short narrow scar, but really, he wanted to see if his hair was green elsewhere.  
  
So off came the shoes and pants. Leaning his back against the sink, using the light to make sure, he decided he didn't color his hair. It was green all the way down and curly, disorderly, and a little matted around the edges with blood that didn't know where it belonged.  
  
He had skinny legs, he decided, long skinny legs. At least the hair on them was paler, a softer green. Holding to the edge of the sink, he closed his eyes, drew one knee to his belly, then slowly extended it out, up higher than his head, foot angled so the impact would be at the very side of his foot. He held the kick until his stomach threatened dire revenge, then shook out the tension and did the same kick on the other side. Balance, he thought. Balanced was good.  
  
The plug went into the tub and was quickly followed by hot water, and a generous splash of rose bubble bath, which he highly doubted was his. It stung too, which he supposed he deserved, as he sank down into the warm water and bubbles. Arms on the edge of the tub, feet hanging out the other end, and everything in between covered with pinkish rose colored bubbles, he felt damn happy and it would be perfect if he just had a cigarette!  
  
Jet woke to find Spike gone and he refused to admit this feeling was panic. There was water running though and he stood outside the bathroom in the dark, listening to Spike hum and the panic faded away. Spike was Spike after all, and Jet smirked into the dark. There really wasn't much that could break Spike. So he walked off, leaving him to his bath. They'd be coming out of the gate in an hour anyway.  
  
Faye was the next one to find her way to the bathroom. Barefooted, she also found her panties. Which she scooped up as she ground her teeth. Her room was close enough to the bathroom and had plenty of light to show the nice large dark footprints in the silk of her most intimate bits. "ACHHHHH!"  
  
Jet instinctively looked innocent, even if he were in the kitchen and far away from anything that could have gone wrong. It made things sound pretty normal though, Faye's stream of cursing at them both. Normal was good. 


	5. Flying Again

Smoking Lessons 5/5 By Nix  
  
Disclaimers. I still don't own them and I wrote this draft just for the fun of it. Some other draft might be more serious, but I still wouldn't own Spike. Tsk  
  
Warnings.. lots of cussing, some blood, a dog fight when the Bebop comes under attack, a yaoi kiss  
Spike's bath lasted until the Bebop rocked and leaned to the side, splashing slightly warm bath water over the wall. He gritted his teeth against the protest of his stomach, gripped the sides of the tub. Bubbles dripped from his nose and he struggled out, slipping on the floor as he reached for his clothes. He just knew in his gut that the Bebop was not supposed to go tilt like that.  
  
Warning sirens screamed and woke Ed from her nap. Ein barked and the two of them raced off towards the living area where Jet's pilot chair was. She ran into Faye on the way and they stood there on the stairs, watching out the view port. Fighters, little one man craft circled around them, and Faye had the insane idea that they were Indians after the cowboys. She shoved Ed back and ran towards Jet. "What the hell? What do they want? Aren't we in Eropa's airspace?"  
  
"Yeah, we are. They don't reply." Jet replied trying to get some retreat trajectory laid in, but they were all around the Bebop, a whole sphere of nasty little drones. "I think she changed her mind."  
  
Another blast hit the ship and Spike stumbled into the lounge, one hand half stuck in his tie, that he figured he hadn't any hope of tying right. "What's going on?"  
  
Faye turned to face him, both hands behind her on Jet's chair, touching the bigger man with just the tips of her fingers. Her face was tight, lips drawn thin as she sized him up, weighed him. He straightened up, gave her back a disdainful look, played with his tie for a moment more and just decided it was the way he wanted it. "We're under fire, idiot. Why don't you just go shot them down!"  
  
Spike shoved his hands into his pockets that he had again. "You said Jet had cigarettes?"  
  
Jet took them out of his pocket and handed them back to Faye, who took one and tossed them to Spike, who caught them easily. Her expression lightened a little as he tapped one out and took the lighter from the side of the pack, lit up without looking clumsy about it. He tossed them back as he pulled his first long drag. "Jet?"  
  
"I'm trying! Eropa ISSP isn't responding." Jet did things to the controls that Spike didn't even try to figure out. There was a furious desperation in Jet's words though.  
  
Ed sat on the stairs that went up to the level above this one, Ein between her legs, her head on his, just watching, and Spike pulled another drag on his cigarette. This was his family. He took off up the stairs, not running, not fast, just one step at a time, in part because he didn't think he could look all cool and relaxed if he ran and pissed his stomach off.  
  
"Where the hell are you going," Faye screamed at him, indignant.  
  
"Going to shot them down," he said, sticking his head back into view at the top, for one last shot, "Bitch."  
  
He wasn't sure what made him think he had something to shot them down up this way. Faye's voice certainly didn't hold out any hope for him. The Redtail came into view first, and he groaned, considering if he'd rather get shot down or fly that. Beyond that though, under a tarp, and being worked on maybe, was something else entirely.  
  
The wings were folded up, propulsion units glittered with polished chrome that seemed beautiful and out of place.  
  
"Wait! Spike!" Jet's voice screamed, but that only made Spike walk faster, long strides, light step.  
  
He laid a hand on the red painted metal, drew his fingers along it, soaking in the texture, the roughness under the seam. This was his lover, his true lover. He closed his eyes and keyed in the entry code. If asked, he couldn't have said what he coded in, but he could do it with his eyes closed. The pod opened, and he climbed inside, settling into the gray leather interior like he was making love to space herself.  
  
"There are too many of them! Spike! Eropa is sending help! You're not fit to go out there!"  
  
Spike smirked, eyes gentle as he swallowed Jet whole, his gruff over protectiveness, the feeling that they'd had an interaction like this before. "Then you don't have to be responsible for me, okay?"  
  
"Spike!" Jet jumped the railing and got to the very edge of the Swordfish, on hand on Spike's arm. "Spike."  
  
He understood the words that were hard to say, understood with a clarity of someone who didn't have a lot to block his vision. "I like you too. Kiss me when I get home?"  
  
"Spike!"  
  
"Now get off my ship. I want to blow things up. I'm good at that, aren't I?" He couldn't very well close his eyes to start the launch sequence with Jet looking, so he focused on looking into Jet's eyes. They were beautiful eyes, warm eyes. Maybe it was like grabbing Faye's butt because he knew it would piss her off, or maybe it was a desire to be nearer to the warmth he saw in those eyes. He leaned closer, ignoring his stomach and took charge of his life, made the dominoes fall in the direction he wanted them too, and pressed his lips to Jet's. There was a moment where they just sat there. The ship shuddered . Faye screamed and Spike recognized the Redtail firing up. Jet had his fingers into that wild green hair though, holding him. Jet's hand took up the whole back of his head, his tongue filled his mouth and Spike returned it like it was the first kiss of his life. They danced together there like the rest of the world didn't exist, only biting softly on Jet's lip, drawing a moan out of him. Then Spike's cigarette burned his fingers and he pulled back, "Son of a bitch!"  
  
Jet ran his fingers down Spike's face, thumb tracing the line of his eyebrow. "You don't color your hair, do you?"  
  
"Nope," Spike said, following it with a crooked and suggestive grin. "I'll be back."  
  
It was worth it, Jet though, worth the loss, if this was it. "You're worth it."  
  
"Well, fuck the maudlin shit," Spike said, taking another cigarette out of the pack he'd just pick pocketed from Jet. "I suppose they taste better if you smoke each one as if it's the last? No, maybe not." Without looking Spike cut the conversation in half as he closed his hatch. The doors to the launch deck were already open, and he though about that, only the launch as Bebop's computer taxied the Swordfish out. Would it be worth it? To lose this sweet everything, just for that kiss? To come back from nothing, just get a taste for living, only to get that kiss? He didn't know, but he figured he'd do it again, and again. Holding the cigarette between his teeth, he let smoke out as his wings unfolded and the Bebop threw him down into the black of space.  
  
There was no up or down and for a moment he panicked. Closing his eyes though, he found the right and left, up and down thrust, and he found the kiss of flight. He hooked his feet into the floorboard throttle, breaking system, and spun the Swordfish around, firing his particle beam without even thinking about it. Enemy craft went to pieces and he banked left, loving the way the speed created gravity shoved him back into the soft leather, shoved his guts back against his spine. It was hard as hell to smoke without his hands though and there was no way he was dropping the damn thing now.  
  
Debris rose over the starboard horizon of the Bebop, and Faye cheered through the com.  
  
Words mumbled, he snapped, "Just hit the targets, nothing else."  
  
"OH! Like you should talk! You threatened to shoot me once!" More debris radiated from where she was. "Just shoot these damn things, will you?"  
  
Spike found the control to his machine gun and sprayed it out, as he rolled the Swordfish, trusting the little ship more than he'd trusted his own body hours earlier. Explosions rocked him from behind and he braked left, accelerated right, spun around and used the last energy of the particle canon to disintegrate three of their attackers. The Bebop was slowly rotating, spinning without power though and as it turned, Spike saw their real enemy, a much larger ship, already launching another flock of smaller fighters at them. "Jet, when you think we're gonna get that help?"  
  
There was no reply and Spike took that for a bad sign. He remembered asking if he was supposed to have died. He kind of thought the answer was yes, but that shouldn't ought to be true for his family, his friends.  
  
"I'm out of ammo," Faye snarled into the com.  
  
Spike saw her hanging there, could see right into her pod, how she hung over her controls, chin on her folded arms. "Then run," Spike spat back, spraying fire at the new attackers, taking them out as they circled the Redtail, this time catching return fire of his own. She looked up, as he rolled right over the top of her, smiling down at her. Then he saw the smoke, traced it back to his right wing. The Redtail dropped down, spun and then she too saw the bigger ship. "Oh fuck me!"  
  
"Not till we're done," he teased, fighting with his right accelerator.  
  
"Spike, you do remember me, don't you?"  
  
The cigarette was nothing but butt now and he spit it out. "Yeah, of course I do, Faye," he said, she didn't say for how long he had to remember her for that to be true. "That was your bubble bath I used up this morning, uh?"  
  
"You used it all? Shit, Spike, didn't you remember to add water?"  
  
He noticed the falling number on his control panel and it made sense that it was a meter of bullet remaining. Damn it fell fast. "What other weapons do I have on this thing?"  
  
"Missiles," Jet's voice came back, "Fire them and get back inside. Hurry up!"  
  
"Why?" Faye asked. She used her missiles already anyway. Less mess to clean up if she died in her own space, she thought.  
  
"Because I said so!" Jet said, and there was some energy to his voice, some hope that moved her.  
  
Spike's missiles fired, taking out another group of incoming fighters, but the energy of it rolled the Swordfish nose over jets. He went right back over the top of the Redtail, red trailing around the inside of his pod. "Spike!"  
  
He heard her. He just felt too comfortable to remember how to reach out and respond. It was raining inside his pod, dark rain, and he closed his eyes, just enjoyed the floating. Some part of his mind told him it was that his oxygen was corrupt and he ought to switch tanks. Ought to, yes, fingers reaching for that fought against the floating, fought against the grating sound of Faye screaming at him through the com. Yeah, thanks, he thought, now shut up, you're irritating me. Watching through the top of his pod he saw the expanse of space beyond the solar system come into view, not a trace of human debris or anything more solid than just the pretty twinkling lights. Out there somewhere there were other lives, other cultures? One floating hand reached towards the top of his pod, towards the pretty lights and he really wanted to know! Really wanted to go there, to see what was out there in all that pretty light.  
  
Faye could not have been more pissed off.  
  
"Just get him! Hurry up, Faye!"  
  
Jet wasn't helping. With shaking hands she aimed the Redtail's pincher at Spike's particle canon. This was not the long round part of him that she wanted real bad to grab a hold of! And twist if she could. Damn him! She didn't know how long she had before it wasn't worth pulling his floating ass back inside.  
  
"Come on, Faye! Ed could have done it by remote by now!"  
  
"Well fucking let her then!" Faye knew Ed couldn't do it. She would have if she could have. The Swordfish had caught a missile in the main engine and it should have gone up like so much red confetti, but Spike was the luckiest bastard in all of humanity. Her attention was on the Swordfish and all the blood in the pod, so she didn't see the slender black craft that had risen up from Eropa, docked on the belly of the Bebop. "Come on Spike, you prick, I didn't get to tell you that I love you!"  
  
He smiled and disgusted himself with a bit of wet slipping passed his lips. "Love you too, Faye Faye."  
  
"Oh shut up! You think everything is a god damn joke!" But she got hold of his canon and started backwards towards the Bebop. The Bebop was moving again, powered by the black ship docked to it and the flight deck rose around the ships, swallowing them alive.  
  
Even before the docking clamps had the Redtail, Faye was out of her pod, running to get the pod of the Swordfish open, get clean air in there. Gravity had pulled Spike down into his seat again, sprawled him out like a bad drinking binge. She keyed his entry code. Nothing happened. She keyed his normal alternate and nothing. "Now was a shit of a time for better security!"  
  
Someone was running in her direction. Faye didn't look, figured she'd rather hear him bitch later, and pulled her gun and shot the hell out of the sealing mechanism on the Swordfish. The pod opened, but Spike was laying there, eyes open and she snarled a scream, remembering how dead he'd looked after the fall from the cathedral. "You son of a bitch!"  
  
Someone shoved her out of the way, roughly and jumped up in the pod. Some blue haired Asian woman and Faye lunged for her as this woman straddled Spike and slammed a hypojector to his throat. Jet caught Faye by an arm and jerked her back. "She's a friend!"  
  
The woman pulled an eyespray set up from where it was tucked in the back of her pants and looked into one eye, the other, "Which one is the natural eye?"  
  
Jet and Faye looked at each other, looked back at her. She snarled at them, then picked the darker eye. The eye spray tool reached out, gently opened his eye, then sprayed light, so bright that Faye turned and hide her face against Jet's chest.  
  
"Now, High?" Edward asked over the com, voice seeming to come out of Jet's shoulder. "Now? Can we go now?"  
  
The woman pulled the eye sprayer back, moved to get right eye to eye with Spike, holding his chin in her hands, he blinked, started to come to, blinking a lot and reaching for her hand on his chin. "What's your name?"  
  
"Spike, now get the hell off of me."  
  
She took her first deep breath and jerked his shirt up, ran a finger along his belly, which was closed again. "Yeah, now, Ed!"  
  
From outside, the black ship fired thrusters to the aft, fired something else to the fore, something that made the blackness of space granulate and spin like colored sand falling into a furnace to become glass. Only Ed saw it, watched space granulate all the way up to the main view port and then the ship herself turned into spilling sugar.  
  
From the viewpoint of the captain of the ship sent to kill them, the Bebop shuddered, glowed, and simply disappeared. It was good for him. He sent back the report that Spike Spiegel and company were dead. It wasn't true, but then faking one's death is a damn good way to get away from the syndicate. 


End file.
